My Two-for-Tuesday morning train WFH reads:
• Liquid Alts: How to Protect Your Investment Portfolio Without Going Broke Yet despite the rosier outlook, hedge funds should still be approached with caution. There are few funds that consistently meet, let alone beat, their benchmarks. The best funds have tons of investment dollars chasing them, making them less available even to high-net-worth investors. Then there’s the issue of fees: It’s rare to see a fund still demanding the traditional 2% of assets and 20% of profits, but even the average 1.4% management fee and 16.4% performance fee is a challenging hurdle to beat, and quite high for cost-conscious investors.(Barron’s)
• Pluto is a Planet This is where economics and finance differ from physics and chemistry. Money is a story created by and agreed upon by humans. Money is a social contract. With it, we have propelled an amazing amount of progress in the last century and a half. We’ve made improvements and experienced failures along the way. But to stick our heads in the sand and pretend it doesn’t change is a grave mistake.(Belle Curve)
• Direct Indexing: Let The Games Begin Institutional money has been building custom indexes for a long time, but retail investors are just starting to gain access to it. This was made possible by improvements in technology and especially the advent of free trading. The 30% annual growth in assets is impressive, but at just ~$350 billion, the game has just begun. (Irrelevant Investor) see also The Cutting Edge Paul Volcker once quipped “The only thing useful banks have invented in 20 years is the ATM,” but I have to disagree: We live in a golden age of innovation for investors, banking, and financial transactions. (TBP)
• Why this Facebook scandal is different Internal evidence shared by former Facebook product manager Frances Haugen shows Facebook has known — but ignored — the harm it causes. (Recode)
• Can We Suck Up Enough CO2 to Cool the Planet? As we speak, giant machines are removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere in an urgent attempt to slam the brakes on climate change. (Reasons To Be Cheerful) see also Desalination can make saltwater drinkable — but it won’t solve the U.S. water crisis The water in the ocean is a tempting resource. Removing salt comes with environmental and economic costs, though. (Washington Post)
• Rogue Americans stashed assets offshore, eluding victims and impeding investigators Documents expose how a prolific offshore operator in Belize accepted and served suspect American clients by setting up trusts and shell companies. The records also underscore the challenges faced by government investigators probing cases of fraud, tax evasion and corruption and the struggles of victims trying to find and claim money. (Washington Post)
• The Geography of Vaccines Analysis of vaccination rates across U.S. metro areas shows how the shots have become the latest flashpoint in a divided America. (Citylab) see also How Asia, Once a Vaccination Laggard, Is Revving Up Inoculations Several countries are now on track to surpass the United States in fully vaccinating their populations, lifting hopes of a more permanent return to normality. (New York Times)
• This One Metric Shows That New York City Will Be Fine Gotham is No. 1 when it comes to the risk-adjusted return of investments in homes. That signals confidence that the pandemic recovery will be lasting as well as robust. The New York City home has not only appreciated strongly, it has done so with the narrowest price fluctuations among 20 major U.S. cities. That means New York homes provided the greatest risk-adjusted return during the past 12 months ended June 30. (Bloomberg)
• Jony Ive on What He Misses Most About Steve Jobs On the 10th anniversary of Steve Jobs’s death, Sir Jony Ive reflects on their collaborations and friendship: “My understanding of him refuses to remain cozy or still.” (WSJ Magazine) see also How Apple built the iPhone 13’s Cinematic Mode “When you look at the design process,” says Manzari, “we begin with a deep reverence and respect for image and filmmaking through history. We’re fascinated with questions like what principles of image and filmmaking are timeless? What craft has endured culturally and why?” (TechCrunch)
• The Biggest Album Release Dates in Modern Music History, Ranked September 24, 1991, is often called the biggest release day in history. We came up with a formula to see whether that was the case. (The Ringer)
Be sure to check out our Masters in Business interview this weekend with Jack Schwager, author of various Market Wizard books. He is also the founder of Fund Seeder, a platform designed to match undiscovered trading talent with capital worldwide. His latest book is “Unknown Market Wizards: The best traders you’ve never heard of.”
How Low Can Fund Fees Go?
Source: Morningstar
